


rhyme and reason

by kat777



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Character Study, ESPECIALLY THE FINALE AND THE ORIGIN EPS, Gen, SPOILERS FOR LITERALLY ALL OF SEASON ONE, Speculation, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-21
Updated: 2016-03-21
Packaged: 2018-05-28 02:34:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6311785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kat777/pseuds/kat777
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Here’s how it goes:</p><p>There’s a mysterious chest, and that chest holds up to seven powerful stones. </p><p>Humans can hold these stones, too, and that’s where the trouble starts.</p><p>Humans are always where the trouble starts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	rhyme and reason

**Author's Note:**

> I literally cannot stress this enough, this fic is filled to the brim with SPOILERS for literally all of season 1, especially the finale and the origin eps. Read at your own risk.

Here’s how it goes:

There’s a mysterious chest, and that chest holds up to seven powerful stones.

Humans can hold these stones, too, and that’s where the trouble starts.

Humans are always where the trouble starts.

* * *

There’s a bracelet, and when the world is in danger, it’s offered to a young man. He accepts it, and all that comes with it. The power. The responsibility. The adventure. And the _people_.

The people. Mentors, enemies, friends.  Lovers, rivals, teammates. Partners. Children. Family.

He outlives them all, all but his mentor turned lifelong companion, there from almost the beginning, destined to be there long after the one he calls Master is gone.

Master.

That young man from all those years ago has grown old. Where he was once the student, now he is the teacher. Where he was once chosen, now the choices are his.

‘Master’ is not the name that young man picked for himself all those years ago.

If he had known the true price of accepting the bracelet, perhaps he would not have picked a name at all.

* * *

There’s a fan and a book, a very important book, and they fall into the hands of a woman. She looks at them and sees all they offer.

But she has her power and her responsibility; she goes to work every day and fights tirelessly to change the world.

She makes her life an adventure, and she shares it with the people she loves. Her coworkers, her friends, her parents, her sister, and most of all her husband and son.

She sets the fan inside the book and hides them both away in her bedside drawer.

She already has a name, and she doesn’t want another.

* * *

Something goes wrong.

The woman who never looked twice at the prospect of adventures beyond imagining suddenly boards a plane in the middle of the night without a word to anyone.

Her coworkers are baffled and a little uneasy, but life is busy and sometimes these things happen.

Her friends are concerned and a little hurt, but life is strange and sometimes mysteries can’t be solved.

Her parents are shocked and more than a little worried, but life is long and sometimes people come back if you wait.

Her sister is distraught and more than a little angry, but life is hard and sometimes you just have to accept it.

Her husband is terrified until he finds the Tibet pamphlet in his wife’s bedside drawer. He’s devastated until he finds the very important book underneath. He’s enraged when the book’s pages don’t contain the answers for why his wife left and how to bring her back. He’s resigned when the fan proves useless.

Life is bitter, and sometimes there's no hope.                                                                

That’s what he tells his bewildered and grief-stricken young son. That’s what he believes.

Until he finds the broach.

* * *

He finds the broach, and he hears of the ultimate power a pair of earrings and a ring can grant.

He will do anything to get his hands on them. He will do anything to get his wife back.

Gabriel Agreste can’t be a husband without a wife, and he forgets to be a father entirely.

Gabriel Agreste can’t bring his wife back.

Hawk Moth can, and damn the consequences.

* * *

A girl risks her life to save an old man. Some of the treats she got from her father are ruined in the process, but when the old man is distressed by this she offers him one of the remaining good ones.

She seems down on herself, but her heart is open and her smile is kind.

A boy helps an old man up, and he loses his one chance at freedom in the process. He’s taken back to the cage he so desperately wants to escape.

He seems lonely, but his heart is open and his smile is kind.

The old man chooses them, and he has faith.

* * *

The girl puts on earrings, the boy puts on a ring. The girl is uncertain, the boy is eager. They collide and entangle, and that should be the start of their story.

It isn’t.

Because the boy is ready, but the girl hesitates.

A moment to think it over, and the boy says he's Chat Noir. Chat Noir is still learning, but he’s there to protect people.

The girl is frozen in fear, heart pounding in her chest, but her new friend calls out to her and so the girl gathers her courage and saves the day.

Then her new friend asks for her name.

A moment to think it over, and the girl says to call her Ladybug.

Ladybug and Chat Noir.

That should be the end of their beginning, but it isn’t.

Because something goes wrong.

* * *

Something goes wrong, and the girl falters. She decides she can’t be Ladybug anymore.

Something goes wrong, and the boy stands up. He decides that Chat Noir will do something about it.

But Paris needs them both, and the girl puts the earrings back on to save her friend. Some still doubt her, and she still doubts herself, but she has people who believe in her.

Hawk Moth will do anything to get what he wants, but Ladybug remembers her mother brushing a finger across her cheek, and her father's silly declaration that he'd save her, and her friend swearing Paris' new superheroine would save them all, and her mentor encouraging her to have faith in herself, and her partner's hands on her shoulders.

Ladybug remembers, and when she sees her city under attack, she rises up to defend it.

Hawk Moth might be willing to burn the world down, but Ladybug has the support of her loved ones and the courage that has been there inside her all along, and she will burn brighter.

And where Hawk Moth’s fire hurts, Ladybug’s will heal.

* * *

The man sees his wife in Chat Noir, and then he sees Chat Noir in his son. These observations should make him reconsider his actions. They don't. They give him pause, but they don't stop him. He's too far gone.

The boy finds the book in his father’s secret vault, and it’s stolen from him by a trickster. The girl steals it from the trickster and brings it to the old man.

The boy is panicked, but the girl is learning. Soon the boy will learn, too. He’ll need to, living in close quarters with Hawk Moth.

The necklace is stolen from the chest. A trickster had a taste of power, and a whisper in her ear sends her running back for more.

The trickster steals the necklace, and she becomes Volpina for real.

But here is what Hawk Moth does not understand: not everyone is willing to burn the world down to get what they want.

* * *

The trickster turns on the news and sees herself dangling a boy from the top of the Eiffel Tower, and she _knows_ it was just an illusion, but what she doesn’t know is whether or not she would’ve dropped the boy if he _had_ been real.

She doesn’t like Ladybug, but she watches herself seemingly dangling an innocent boy’s life in her hands without care or remorse, and she realizes she doesn’t like Hawk Moth, either. She doesn’t like the person she became when she listened to his whispering.

Volpina is a fox. Volpina is clever. Volpina is cunning. She steals the necklace and she keeps it, but she does it for herself.

She won’t be Ladybug’s friend or ally, but she won’t be Hawk Moth’s, either.

She’ll take Hawk Moth down all on her own, from the inside, and then all of Paris will see who the _real_ hero is.

* * *

Here’s how it goes:

There’s a chest that holds up to seven very powerful stones.

.

The bracelet is wrapped around the wrist of an old man who has lived far longer than he could’ve ever predicted when he first put it on.

(He remembers the name he originally chose, but no one calls him by it anymore.

Sometimes he feels the joy of being alive so strongly he almost weeps; sometimes he feels he has lived far longer than any human has a right to.)

.

The fan sits in a vault gathering dust, the key to its power on the other side of the world with a woman who once had a family.

(She goes by a new name now, and she misses her old one. 

She misses a lot of things, and her family above all.)

.

The broach is tucked beneath a man’s tie, and it holds the picture of his long absent wife inside it; he opens it now and again, to rekindle his rage whenever reason tries to rear its head.

(Hawk Moth is a means to an end, and Hawk Moth is a shield between a man who wants his wife back and the atrocities he commits in order to accomplish that.

One day that shield will break, and Gabriel Agreste will have to face up to his crimes.)

.

A girl wears the earrings, and a boy wears the ring.

(They wear masks, too, but it doesn’t matter. They each chose a name for themselves and made it their own, and at heart they know each other so well that no matter how much their faith in their partnership is shaken, it will never crumble.

Ladybug and Chat Noir, two heroes fiercely determined to help others. Apart they are strong, but together they are stronger.)

.

A trickster loops the necklace around her wrist and pulls her sleeve down to cover it, keep it out of sight.

(Volpina has her name but her role isn’t what it seems. She’s looking out for number one, but there are lengths she won’t go to.)

.

The comb lies dormant in the chest, and one day someone will claim it.

* * *

The chest is emptied, the chest is filled. The book passes down from generation to generation. The stones are woken and then go back to sleep.

That’s how it goes. That’s how it’s always gone, through centuries.

The mysterious chest is just a chest. The important book is just a book. The powerful stones are just stones.

Until they fall into the hands of people.

**Author's Note:**

> I was so hopeful that Volpina and Ladybug would respect and support one another as badass superheroines… But if Volpina HAS to be working for Hawk Moth next season (and I'm pretty sure she will be, at least for a while), then I really want her to double-cross him and for him to not see it coming because he's too arrogant lol. I want her to be like, "Screw you! I'm not here for this good vs. evil thing, I'm on my own side!"
> 
> Also, the peacock Miraculous is frustrating me. If Gabriel IS Hawk Moth and he has another Miraculous in addition to his butterfly one, wouldn't he just use them both so he could be more powerful? (I’m like 90% sure it’s been established by now that you can use two or more at the same time?) Unless it's actually a fake? Or it's real but the blue kwami managed to escape him? So many possibilities, and so many months between me and the answers I want. Very frustrating.
> 
> Anyways, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed this short fic!


End file.
